A three-month undercover human trafficking operation in Florida has resulted in more than 120 arrests, including alleged child sexual predators and those seeking prostitutes, according to police.
Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister on Thursday unveiled the outcome of "Operation Renewed Hope," which netted 123 trafficking arrests over the past 90 days. Hillsborough County is located in west-central Florida and includes the cities of Tampa, St. Petersburg and Clearwater.
"We targeted this crime through a multi-pronged approach by conducting undercover street walker and hotel and motel operations along with online chats where our undercover investigators posed as minors available for sex as well as guardians selling children for sex," Chronister said at a news conference.
A former elementary school teacher, a mental health hospital nurse, a high school basketball coach and a person employed by a spiritual organization are among those arrested.
"These individuals engaged with undercover detectives who were posing as underage girls and boys. And these criminals knowingly sought to engage in sexual acts with each of them," Chronister said.
The sheriff highlighted the arrest of James Villacorteza, a 28-year-old former science teacher at James Elementary School in Tampa. Villacorteza is facing several charges for soliciting sexual acts from a minor and traveling to meet that minor for sex.
Detectives also focused on reducing the demand for prostitution, which resulted in the arrests of several individuals including 39-year-old Zheng Dong, who was arrested on human trafficking related charges last year.
"In May 2022, he was arrested for traveling to have sex with a minor who turned out to be one of our undercover detectives. He was charged with human trafficking and at the time, you would have thought that this would have been enough to stop him and make him rethink his choices. We were wrong," Chronister said. "Detectives arrested him again for soliciting another to commit prostitution."
The operation also focused on "the darkest corners," and had detectives acting as family members and offering their underage children to have sex with others.
"We posed as aunts, uncles, grandparents. We would pose as stepparents saying that, 'Hey, we have a 10-year-old, an 11-year-old, a 12-year-old that we're willing and is available for sex acts,'" Chronister said. "These individuals, six of them that we charged with human trafficking, were individuals who traveled to come have sex with these minors, these young children."
Chronister said one of the most alarming trends detectives noticed is that some of the suspects were armed.
"As if the sexual exploitation is not damaging enough, who knows what their true intentions were with the firearms they possessed," Chronister said. "Why would you need a gun to come have sex with a child? What were their true intentions? This is the part that's even more concerning than them just trying to have this illegal, incredibly heinous act with a young person."
Since the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office launched its Human Trafficking Squad in June 2021, they have arrested 604 people, charging 36 with human trafficking-related charges, and rescued 28 victims from the grips of human trafficking.
"We are not merely apprehending wrongdoers. We are ensuring no one falls into the clutches of these criminals, who would exploit and inflict harm on them," Chronister said.